Vatican offers further guidance on handling cremains

[aussie_aussie_oi_oi]

The Vatican Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith has upheld a rule mandating that the ashes of the deceased be preserved in a consecrated place, but it also said family members could request "a minimal part of the ashes" be kept in a sacred place of "significance for the history of the deceased person." The dicastery also said a parish or diocese could establish "a defined and permanent sacred place" where the cremains of multiple people would be commingled and preserved together.

The permission came in a "note" from the dicastery in response to a letter from Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi of Bologna requesting clarification about the preservation of the ashes of the deceased after cremation. The Vatican published the note signed by Cardinal Víctor Fernández, dicastery prefect, Dec. 12; it said it was approved by Pope Francis Dec. 9.

Cardinal Zuppi said in his letter, dated Oct. 30, that his archdiocese had been seeking "to give a Christian response to problems arising from the increasing number of people desiring to cremate the bodies of the deceased and scatter their ashes in nature."

An archdiocesan commission he set up to study the matter wanted to ensure people were not compelled to scatter ashes due to the economic costs of burial, and it wanted to give guidance regarding what to do with ashes once the term for their preservation in a cemetery loculus or niche had expired. In most Italian cemeteries, if a family does not renew the lease on a burial spot, the bones or ashes are transferred to a communal ossuary or cinerary.
The cardinal asked that, given "the canonical prohibition against scattering the ashes of the deceased, is it possible to prepare a defined and permanent sacred place for the commingled accumulation and preservation of the ashes of the baptized, indicating the basic details of each person so as not to lose the memory of their names, similar to what occurs in ossuaries." He also asked if a family may be allowed "to keep a portion of their family member's ashes in a place that is significant for the history of the deceased."
Referring to its 2016 instruction, "Ad resurgendum cum Christo" ("To Rise with Christ"), regarding the burial of the deceased and the conservation of the ashes in the case of cremation, the dicastery's new note upheld its recommendation to preserve ashes in a special urn and to keep ashes "in a sacred place, such as a cemetery, or in an area dedicated to this purpose, provided that it has been so designated by the ecclesiastical authority."
"An attitude of sacred respect" must be had toward the ashes of the deceased person, which are to be kept in "a sacred place suitable for prayer," it added. The faith teaches that "the body of the resurrected person will not necessarily consist of the same elements that it had before it died. Since it is not a simple revivification of the corpse, the resurrection can occur even if the body has been totally destroyed or dispersed," it said. This is why "in many cinerary urns, the ashes of the deceased are conserved together and are not stored separately."Therefore, the dicastery said, "a defined and permanent sacred place can be set aside for the commingled accumulation and preservation of the ashes of deceased baptized persons, indicating the identity of each person so as not to lose the memory of their names." In addition, it said, "the ecclesiastical authority, in compliance with current civil norms, may consider and evaluate a request by a family to preserve in an appropriate way a minimal part of the ashes of their relative in a place of significance for the history of the deceased person."
However, the authorization can be given only if "every type of pantheistic, naturalistic or nihilistic misunderstanding is ruled out and also provided that the ashes of the deceased are kept in a sacred place," the dicastery said.

[peregrinator]

Awful

[Stella]

Which part do you say is 'awful'? It sounds like a very orthodox response to the question being asked by Cardinal Zuppi.

I've made it very clear to my family that I want to be cremated and interred in the Columbarium at the local Church. Especially in the cities, cemetery plots are expensive and out of the way.

[peregrinator]

The awful part is that the responsum "permits" family members to hold on to some of the cremains, as well as for them to be commingled.

[Gandalf the Grey]

The awful part is that the responsum "permits" family members to hold on to some of the cremains, as well as for them to be commingled.

I can't help but wonder if this is another angle which is being taken in order to erode the sense of the supernatural claims of the Church, what Francis has pejoratively labeled "triumphalism," in regards to how we hold the dead in Christ as being victorious as a statement to the secular world and our reverence for the body as being a sign of that belief. How that points to the Church having claims about reality and eternity that the secular world needs to listen to. Francis seems to have a consistent animus against that form of evangelizing-that which emphasizes the spiritual and eternal at the expense of the temporal-that he likes to ascribe words like "fundamentalist" and "proselytizing" to.

It seems to me just another way in which he wants to drag the Church down to the level of the secular.

[Stella]

The awful part is that the responsum "permits" family members to hold on to some of the cremains, as well as for them to be commingled.

I can't help but wonder if this is another angle which is being taken in order to erode the sense of the supernatural claims of the Church, what Francis has pejoratively labeled "triumphalism," in regards to how we hold the dead in Christ as being victorious as a statement to the secular world and our reverence for the body as being a sign of that belief. How that points to the Church having claims about reality and eternity that the secular world needs to listen to. Francis seems to have a consistent animus against that form of evangelizing-that which emphasizes the spiritual and eternal at the expense of the temporal-that he likes to ascribe words like "fundamentalist" and "proselytizing" to.

It seems to me just another way in which he wants to drag the Church down to the level of the secular.

Aquinas would say otherwise.

"For just as grace presupposes nature, so must the Divine law presuppose the natural law." (ST I II 99 2)

In the same way that pagans were evangelised by tapping into the natural god given inclinations so can the secularised be evangelised.

[Gandalf the Grey]

Aquinas would say otherwise.

"For just as grace presupposes nature, so must the Divine law presuppose the natural law." (ST I II 99 2)

Why am I not surprised that you would butcher Aquinas?

All he's saying there is that grace presupposes a rational recipient. That's it. And the objection the statement pertains to has nothing to do with the question at hand.

In the same way that pagans were evangelised by tapping into the natural god given inclinations so can the secularised be evangelised.

Pre-Christian pagans and post-Christian secularists are not the same. Not in the slightest. Pre-Christian pagans are not even the same as post-Christian pagans. And Secularists are a world apart from either of them.

You're statement makes little if any sense.

Secularism has no natural God-given inclinations. In most of it's iterations it at least passively denies God's existence and it explicitly denies the utility, efficacy, or even the relevance of religion. It's a purely materialistic ideology.

"While fully recognizing the value of the present life, the Church cannot look upon it as an end in itself, but only as a movement toward a future life for which preparation must be made by compliance with the laws of nature and the laws of God. Hence there is no possible compromise between the Church and Secularism, since Secularism would stifle in man that which, for the Church, constitutes the highest and truest motives of action, and the noblest human aspirations."

C. A. DUBRAY

[Stella]

Aquinas would say otherwise.

"For just as grace presupposes nature, so must the Divine law presuppose the natural law." (ST I II 99 2)

Why am I not surprised that you would butcher Aquinas?

All he's saying there is that grace presupposes a rational recipient. That's it. And the objection the statement pertains to has nothing to do with the question at hand.

It pains me to say but you speak a lot of self aggrandizing rubbish overlaid with fig jam. Aquinas was referencing natural virtue innate in mankind. He rightly submits that virtue acquired naturally can precede grace but then is elevated by that grace to the Christian life.

In the same way that pagans were evangelised by tapping into the natural god given inclinations so can the secularised be evangelised.

Pre-Christian pagans and post-Christian secularists are not the same. Not in the slightest. Pre-Christian pagans are not even the same as post-Christian pagans. And Secularists are a world apart from either of them.

You're statement makes little if any sense.

Secularism has no natural God-given inclinations. In most of it's iterations it at least passively denies God's existence and it explicitly denies the utility, efficacy, or even the relevance of religion. It's a purely materialistic ideology.

"While fully recognizing the value of the present life, the Church cannot look upon it as an end in itself, but only as a movement toward a future life for which preparation must be made by compliance with the laws of nature and the laws of God. Hence there is no possible compromise between the Church and Secularism, since Secularism would stifle in man that which, for the Church, constitutes the highest and truest motives of action, and the noblest human aspirations."

C. A. DUBRAY

Well if you're gonna quote the guy who's only claim to fame is making yummy chocolates, we're done.

[Gandalf the Grey]

It pains me to say but you speak a lot of self aggrandizing rubbish overlaid with fig jam.

Accusing me of things that you in fact do on a regular and extremely verbose basis isn't exactly the sort of flex that you want to believe it is.

Aquinas was referencing natural virtue innate in mankind. He rightly submits that virtue acquired naturally can precede grace but then is elevated by that grace to the Christian life.

And this has nothing to do with the natural virtue innate in mankind. It has to do with an ideology that specifically and purposely undermines that virtue as a fundamental principle and your mistaken belief that such an ideology can be reconciled with Catholicism and thus be evangelized.

It's as vapid and insipid as claiming that with the sort of "evangelization" you're proposing that there can even be such a thing as a Catholic atheist.

Well if you're gonna quote the guy who's only claim to fame is making yummy chocolates, we're done.

Dubray was a Professor of Catholic Philosophy at Marist College and a contributor to the Catholic Encyclopedia which is where the quote came from.

But it makes sense that because he contradicts your muddled perspective that you would try to discredit and dismiss via the Genetic Fallacy.